beside her, putting a hand on her shoulder. He said what we’d all been thinking.
“He didn’t have anyone but pack,” he said. Then he rubbed her shoulder gently. “But he did have us, darling. We had his back when things went rough—and he had ours.”
“He saved my life,” I said.
I met Mary Jo’s wet eyes—mostly to avoid looking at Paul’s shade, who had shown up, looking lost, as soon as Mary Jo had acknowledged that he had loved her.
She nodded. “He was not an easy man, Mercy. But he was a good person to have at your back.”
“I know,” I told her sincerely.
“What he wasn’t,” George said, “was sentimental. Back to work, me hearties. Time and tide wait for no one.”
“We’re not sailing anywhere,” said Mary Jo. “So we don’t care about the tide, even if we were anywhere near the ocean. Maybe you should lay off the pirate game for a while. It’s warping your brain.”
“His brain is already warped,” I said.
George grinned at me. “I know you are, but what am I?”
I stuck my tongue out at him and we all got back to work. Paul lingered, touching a book or two as we packed them or fingering the empty bookcase. Sometimes he would reach out and almost caress Mary Jo—but not quite.
This shade wasn’t really Paul, I could tell—not like when he’d talked to me just after he’d died. But his shade made me sad. Sadder. So I didn’t look at him. At it.
* * *
• • •
Elizaveta made it back in time to just miss the funeral. I think she planned it that way—I sure would have under the circumstances.
A taxi dropped her and her luggage at our door smelling of stale air and all the things that go with air travel. She looked . . . old.
“Adam,” she said, brushing by me, and launched into a spate of Russian.
Her face crumpled with grief and loss and he held her while she cried. But his face was— It was probably a good thing she couldn’t see his face. After a moment, though, he closed his eyes and grief deepened the line of his mouth.
“Elizaveta,” I said. “Come sit down. We have a situation here and I think you may be the only one who can clarify what’s going on.”
She started to come in, but took a step back before her foot landed inside the threshold. “It is lovely outside,” she said. “I have just spent most of a day inside planes and airports. Can we sit out on the porch?”
I thought of the cleansing that Sherwood had performed on the house.
“Of course,” I said. “Why don’t you two find a seat and I’ll bring out some iced tea for everyone.” Elizaveta was fond of iced tea.
Eventually we all sat in the comfortable chairs that were scattered in seating groups all over the porch. Elizaveta drank her tea. I did not doubt her grief or her fear.
It sounded like Sherwood’s cat was going to make it. But Elizaveta’s house had been full of the ghosts of people she and her family had tortured to death for power. I couldn’t look at Elizaveta without seeing the face of that half-dead cat, as if he stood for all of her victims. She grieved, and I had not the slightest bit of sympathy.
“We buried the ashes of your family in your garden,” said Adam.
And there had been a lot of bones in that garden, Warren had told us. They had reburied what they found. We were still considering what to do about that garden.
Elizaveta’s face went still. “Oh?” But when he didn’t say anything more, she said, “Thank you. They would have liked that.”
I didn’t think any of her family would like where they were now. But I didn’t generally impose my beliefs on other people—especially when they wouldn’t do anyone any good.
“About the black magic,” she said tentatively. She was watching Adam; my reaction didn’t matter to her.
Adam shook his head. “I understand. I know how witchcraft works.” “Understand” did not mean “approve.”
“They tried to take us once before,” she said, watching him narrowly. “The Hardesty witches. Some sacrifices were necessary to ensure our survival.”
“I see,” Adam said. “Why didn’t you come to us for help?”
“It was at the same time that you and your pack got taken by the government agents,” Elizaveta said. “You were a little busy. By the time matters settled down for you”—after Frost was dead—“they had backed off.” She gave Adam a grim smile.